Row Erupts Over Use of Research Metrics in Job-Cut

document, states that managers established a “quality baseline” by looking at the performance of staff “against key metrics, focussing in particular on research income and quality of individual outputs”. The two metrics used were a five-year average of research income compared with that of researchers at similar universities, and a score called field-weighted citation impact, which measures how often research papers are cited relative to the rest of the papers in their field. Elizabeth Gadd, a research-policy manager at Loughborough University, UK, says that the field-weighted citation-impact metric is not suitable for assessing the work of individual researchers. “It is only stable for large publication sets, for example 10,000 documents or more,” she explains. An open letter to university manage- ment, which has been signed by more than 400 researchers at Liverpool and elsewhere, GETTY says that the metrics used were “particularly The Victoria Building at the University of Liverpool, UK. problematic” and that their use has endan - gered the jobs of the “most collegial faculty members, running technology facilities and serving on the committees that keep our ROW ERUPTS OVER USE departments and institutes running smoothly”. “Assessing staff solely on the basis of quan- OF RESEARCH METRICS IN titative metrics is never acceptable, no matter what type of metric is being used,” it adds. JOB-CUT DECISIONS Confidential discussions Critics say a university put jobs at risk using unreliable The outcry has prompted organizations that advocate the responsible use of metrics to measures related to funding and citations. contact the institution. These include organizers of the Declaration By Holly Else life sciences as part of a reorganization. During on Research Assessment (DORA), of which the January and February, the university notified University of Liverpool is a signatory. The dec- university in the United Kingdom is 47 researchers that their jobs were at risk. laration says that institutions should not use facing criticism over the responsi- In a statement to Nature’s news team, the uni- metrics “to assess an individual scientist’s con- ble use of research metrics, after it versity says that a five-year average of research tributions, or in hiring, promotion, or funding used information about scientists’ income was used to identify researchers whose decisions”. research income and publications to jobs could be at risk, and that “a range of factors A spokesperson for DORA says the organi- Adesignate dozens of jobs as ‘at risk’. that might remove colleagues from the pool of zation has had discussions with the university Critics say that using metrics in such a those potentially at risk were then considered, that remain confidential to allow “a free and decision is inappropriate because the meas- including the contribution of positive citation honest exchange of information and views”. urements tend to focus on a small part of an metrics where appropriate”. The university Some of the authors of the Leiden academic’s job. They add that the institution declined to specify what these metrics were. Manifesto, another statement on the respon- at the centre of the row — the University of The statement says that other indicators sible use of metrics, wrote to the university’s Liverpool — used a metric based on citations were considered, including “impact case study vice-chancellor, Janet Beer, to raise concerns. that is designed to evaluate large groups of authorship, leadership contribution and mem- “We regard the application of quantitative researchers, rather than individuals. bership of external bodies”, and that poten- metrics in a mass redundancy as a major threat The university has defended how it used tially mitigating circumstances — including for recent initiatives on responsible research metrics, and says these weren’t the only fac- impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic, parental metrics,” wrote bibliometricians Ismael Rafols, tors it considered when making the decision. leave and reduced hours because of caring Ludo Waltman and Sarah de Rijcke, at Leiden The debate highlights broader unease about responsibilities — were taken into account. University in the Netherlands. the use of metrics in science as more data are However, an e-mail seen by Nature that was The letter, dated 21 February, outlines collected to assess the quality of researchers’ sent to University of Liverpool staff by the how metrics can be biased towards certain work. Some say these quantitative measures local branch of the University and College research topics or ages, and says this “may of performance concentrate too much on Union, which represents academics across the contravene the basic principle of equal treat- publication records while failing to acknowl- United Kingdom, says that managers identi- ment in employment”. This is the first time to edge other types of work, including teaching, fied employees who are at risk of redundancy their knowledge that metrics have been used committee work and peer review. using two key metrics and did not take other to single out researchers for job cuts at a uni- The University of Liverpool plans to cut aspects of their day-to-day work into account. versity in Europe, the authors add. Rafols says dozens of jobs across its faculty of health and The e-mail, which quotes a university the group has not yet received a response. Nature | Vol 592 | 1 April 2021 | 19 ©2021 Spri nger Nature Li mited. All ri ghts reserved. .

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